Even George R.R. Martin Confuses Common Words in the Newly Leaked Winds of Winter Chapter

[SPOILER FREE--Don't worry. We wouldn't do that to you.]

George R.R. Martin has now leaked another chapter of the highly-anticipated book Winds of Winter from the A Song of Ice and Fire series (known by HBO viewers as Game of Thrones). As dedicated A Song of Ice and Fire fans, we were thrilled to read and analyze every drop of the story that Martin was willing to dole out to us. It has been an entire year since he has teased us with another chapter, and with Season 5 of Game of Thrones premiering this weekend, the timing couldn't be better. 

At Correctica, our dedication to finding and correcting misused words, articles, and homophones on the web isn't something we can just turn off. So when reading (and loving) this new excerpt we were thrust out of Martin's Westoros world a few times when we noticed some glaring misused words and homophones. 

George R.R. Martin is an incredibly talented writer whose ability to create an elaborate fantasy world with complex, interweaving storylines seems almost superhuman.  That being said, we have learned that no one is immune to making grammatical errors--not even someone who notably takes the care to work on a book series for decades. 

Here are some of the errors we found: 

[Note: These excerpts aren't plot spoilers, but we blacked out names because people, rightly, have varying ideas of what is considered a spoiler.]

1) Shudder Not Shutter:

Martin writes that the character in this excerpt could not help but "shutter." What he actually intends to write is that the character could not help but shudder. A shutter is a hinged panel that covers a window or a part of a camera. You shudder in fear or in revulsion. 

2) Soon Not Sound:

In this line, Martin writes the character "sound found herself laughing." This is less of a confusion of the words soon and sound, and more of a typing mistake that happens when your brain is working faster than your fingers. But, alas, your grammar checker will see that sound is spelled correctly and will typically not mark it as an error. 

3) Forgot Not Forget:

Here, Martin writes that "she forget who she was." We assume he intended to write that "she forgot who she was." 

Correctica takes into account the context of your words when it scans your website or document. So if you write that you are "bear naked," you may, in fact, mean that you are as naked as a bear. More than likely, you mean that you are completely naked. Although both "bear" and "naked" are correctly-spelled words, Correctica will recognize a writer's probable meaning when using those two words together and will identify this as an error. 

Our objective isn't to expose or taunt people who make errors, but to show that no one is immune to them. Whether you have been writing a seven-book series since 1991 or you are updating your website, resume, or blog, we are all susceptible to errors. 

If you would like to check your own website for grammatical errors such as misused homophones, idioms, and articles, scan your website with our free demo. You may also check your resume, blog, article or chapter using our automated Proof It Free tool.

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[Image created by Yulia Nikolaeva]